It’s been a long, exhausting week, and I am quite relieved to be out on the porch of The House on the Hill with an entire relaxing weekend ahead of me.

Since it’s felt like something of a ghost town on WordPress lately, I thought this week’s Think Tank post should deal with Ghosts.

So put on your Deep Thinking togas, and join me for a haunting edition of the Friday Night Think Tank.

Don’t worry, we’ll keep the lights on in case any of you are scared of Ghosts…

This week’s topic: You die and enter the afterlife. When you arrive at your eternal destination, you are told that there is a problem with your reservation. Due a heavy influx of new arrivals and some unexpected construction delays, your place in the great hereafter isn’t quite ready yet.

You’ll have to go back down to Earth as a Ghost for a few years until they can clear up the situation. Since this is all their mistake, they want to be very accommodating and offer you the pick of any haunting in the entire world.

Since you have no choice but to go back as a Ghost, what one place would you choose to haunt until your eternal reward is ready for you? Do you choose to be a friendly Ghost or a scary one?

The good news is I’ve made it to Heaven, Modern Philosophers. I’m all about the silver linings here. Since I know Heaven awaits, I’ve got no problem haunting Earth for a few years until St. Peter has a place available for me.

It certainly beats spending that time in Purgatory, or worse yet…in Hell!

I almost went with Yankee Stadium. I bet there are some pretty cool Ghosts there already, and I’d get to watch my beloved Yankees every time they were in town.

Then I got to thinking that the Yankees only play 81 home games. Sure, there would be some college football and soccer games (snooze!), as well as awesome concerts when the Yankees weren’t using the place, but would that be enough for me?

Plus, Yankee Stadium is mostly outdoors and it gets cold in The Bronx in the winter, and can be sweltering in the summer. As much as I love the Yankees, I can’t see myself haunting a mostly empty stadium for a few years.

I’d go with an old movie theater, most likely The Pavilion in Park Slope. That was the theater near where I lived when I was married.

As a friendly Ghost, I could watch movies for a few years, hang out with moviegoers, haunt the ice cream parlor up on the balcony, and look out onto Prospect Park when the theater was closed. That was a pretty heavenly view from what I remember.

Movie theaters are always well air conditioned in the summer, and toasty warm during the winter. Being back in Brooklyn would make me feel safe and secure, and perhaps with all my spare time, I could finally work out some issues from that time in my life that still haunt me to this day.

I think The Pavilion would be the perfect place to wait out the days until my my forever digs were ready. What about you, Modern Philosophers?

42 Responses to Friday Night Think Tank: A Haunting Question

So, is this kinda like being dropped off from jail, where you get dropped off in a specific place but are theoretically free to go anywhere? Or are you trapped in a particular location? How big of a place are you limited to?

Also, how good is your ability to communicate with the living? I think whether I would be relegated to spectator status or could reasonably expect some attention would change my answer.

“Free” you say? All right then – I will haunt the Great Wall of China. I will blow an encouraging wind at the back of all the Great Wall marathon runners, and I will whisper in the tourists’ ears. I will appear to locals as a non-ghost person just so I can practice my Chinese. I will sneak back in time to witness all the history that the Great Wall has seen and I will whisper hints about the future to very, very confused soldiers and workers.

I’d haunt my own house. That way I can toss anyone out of my house who threatened my family. If developers came in and wanted to ruin the area, they’re outta here.. I could save the environment and protect my family, too. 🙂

Mid NaNoWriMo at the moment so have a scrambled brain. Either my house so I could keep an eye on my family, or if communication with the living is out then perhaps Stirling Castle (just down the road from me) 🙂

You’ll probably get a similar haunting from most people with kids 😛 A third one that would give anyone a chance at something totally unusual would be the international space station (though it’s not on Earth so I don’t know if it qualifies 😛 )

I think I would find me a huge zoo and haunt it. The animals would be good for entertainment and when I got bored I could scare them and in turn watch the reactions of the visitors watching frightened animals run for their lives.

It would be big enough for me to not be stuck in any one location and there are always fun things going on.

Isn’t that the purpose of Friday night THINK tank? I’m starting to wonder if you are actually a philosopher? I sort of get the feeling you might be a comedy writer? Not that there is much difference likely.

I’d haunt the ” Saturday Night Live” set. I could sit back and watch all the crazy stuff that goes on there. If Adam Sandler came in to the set, I’d follow him around & whisper in his ear. At times, I would check on my family, to make sure things are going well for them.